Mary Beth Berkoff: Continuous Care Retirement Communities Offer a Holistic Way of Life

Mary Beth Berkoff: Continuous Care Retirement Communities Offer a Holistic Way of Life

Author: Gail Zelitzky and Catherine Marienau December 17, 2025 Duration: 27:00

Mary Beth Berkoff, age 82, founded her own PR company in her late 50s—and she still knows how to spotlight what’s good. Long before that, she was a teacher, an injury-prevention pioneer, and a public-affairs leader who helped pass Illinois’s seatbelt and child-restraint laws. Those roles taught her resilience, resourcefulness, and, as she likes to say, that “if you can teach junior high students, you can do anything.”

Today, that same spirit infuses her life at The Admiral at the Lake, a continuous care retirement community in Chicago, where her gift for connecting people enriches both her days and those around her.

Widowed in recent years, Mary Beth says that loss has both challenged and affirmed the words she lives by: “There is always something good around the next corner… I don’t stay defeated… I believe my life will continue to be great; I just need to do the work.”

“There is no lonely where I live in community with other interesting and welcoming people.” - Mary Beth Berkoff

Connect with Mary Beth:  

Email: mbberkoff@mac.com  

www.theadmiral.org

Recognizing the Age-Wise Collective

Women Over 70 is a proud member of the Age-Wise Collective, comprised of women-led podcasts that feature stories from women 50+ and topics that promote the pro-aging movement.

Meet Suzy Rosenstein, podcast host of Women in the Middle: Loving Life After 50. Suzy shares the good, bad, ugly, and sometimes downright hysterical about growing older and making the changes women want so they don’t have regrets in their second chapter.


Hosted by Gail Zelitzky and Catherine Marienau, Women Over 70: Aging Reimagined turns the page on a well-worn cultural script. This is not a series about decline, but a collection of dialogues focused squarely on expansion. You’ll hear from women who are starting businesses, deepening their creative practices, forging new relationships, and confronting societal expectations with a refreshing blend of honesty and humor. These conversations, rooted in personal journals and lived expertise, delve into the practical and the profound-from the science of longevity to the personal journeys of resilience that define this chapter. The podcast moves beyond inspiration to offer tangible insight, framing the later decades as a time of active reinvention. Tune in for stories that replace stereotypes with specificity, and discover a community redefining what it means to grow older with purpose and curiosity.
Author: Language: English Episodes: 50

Women Over 70: Aging Reimagined
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